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These are incontrovertible facts in regard to the
pseudo-substance of the Sensible realm: if they apply also in
some degree to the True Substance of the Intellectual, the
coincidence is, doubtless, to be attributed to analogy and
ambiguity of terms.
We are aware that "the first" is so called only in relation to
the things which come after it: "first" has no absolute
significance; the first of one series is subsequent to the last
of another. "Substrate," similarly, varies in meaning [as applied
to the higher and to the lower], while as for passivity its very
existence in the Intellectual is questionable; if it does exist
there, it is not the passivity of the Sensible.
It follows that the fact of "not being present in a subject [or
substrate] is not universally true of Substance, unless presence
in a subject be stipulated as not including the case of the part
present in the whole or of one thing combining with another to
form a distinct unity; a thing will not be present as in a
subject in that with which it co-operates in the information of a
composite substance. Form, therefore, is not present in Matter as
in a subject, nor is Man so present in Socrates, since Man is
part of Socrates.
Substance, then, is that which is not present in a subject. But
if we adopt the definition "neither present in a subject nor
predicated of a subject," we must add to the second "subject" the
qualification "distinct," in order that we may not exclude the
case of Man predicated of a particular man. When I predicate Man
of Socrates, it is as though I affirmed, not that a piece of wood
is white, but that whiteness is white; for in asserting that
Socrates is a man, I predicate Man [the universal] of a
particular man, I affirm Man of the manhood in Socrates; I am
really saying only that Socrates is Socrates, or that this
particular rational animal is an animal.
It may be objected that non-presence in a subject is not peculiar
to Substance, inasmuch as the differentia of a substance is no
more present in a subject than the substance itself; but this
objection results from taking a part of the whole substance, such
as "two-footed" in our example, and asserting that this part is
not present in a subject: if we take, not "two-footed" which is
merely an aspect of Substance, but "two-footedness" by which we
signify not Substance but Quality, we shall find that this
"two-footedness" is indeed present in a subject.
We may be told that neither Time nor Place is present in a
subject. But if the definition of Time as the measure of Motion
be regarded as denoting something measured, the "measure" will be
present in Motion as in a subject, while Motion will be present
in the moved: if, on the contrary, it be supposed to signify a
principle of measurement, the "measure" will be present in the
measurer.
Place is the limit of the surrounding space, and thus is present
in that space.
The truth is, however, that the "Substance" of our enquiry may be
apprehended in directly opposite ways: it may be determined by
one of the properties we have been discussing, by more than one,
by all at once, according as they answer to the notions of
Matter, Form and the Couplement.
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